Restaurant shows documents on how they handled child’s hair fire

ROCKDALE COUNTY, Ga. — Channel 2 Action News has reviewed documents and surveillance showing how a Conyers restaurant communicated with the mother of a child whose hair caught fire. It’s a rebuttal to an interview the mother gave earlier in the week.

On Thursday, Shakiera Williams told us how her 8-year-old daughter’s hair caught fire on a tea candle at the Nana’s Chicken-N-Waffles restaurant. The incident happened on Valentine’s Day when the family traveled from Loganville to Conyers to visit the establishment.

Surveillance reviewed on Friday shows the girl rocking back and forth while she operated her tablet. Her ponytail catches fire on the candle that’s set on a window sill, and a family member quickly pats it out with a menu while a restaurant manager rushes to assist and examine the child.

A family member took the girl to a bathroom, before returning their seats where the group stayed for more than an hour, ordered and finished their meals. A receipt shows the restaurant offered the family a discounted meal, and an incident report shows management promised to pay for the girl’s hair appointment.

Williams told Channel 2 the restaurant had not responded to her inquiries about hair appointment reimbursement.

“I have yet to hear from the owner of the restaurant,” Williams said.” No one has called me or expressed sympathy or anything in regards to this situation.”

“Obviously that’s not what happened,” restaurant owner Kelli Ferrell said Friday. “I have the e-mails to prove it. I have the documents to prove it. I have the check to prove it.”

Channel 2 investigative reporter Nicole Carr reviewed a chain of e-mails that show management responses to Williams from the owner’s e-mail accounts. It outlines how restaurant management communicated with Williams between Feb. 16 when Williams wrote in about the incident, and Feb. 25, two days before her interview.

At management’s request, Williams responded with a receipt for the girl’s hair appointment, management apologized for what happened to her daughter, and told her when a check had been mailed.

The only discrepancy was management indicated the check and incident report had been mailed on the 24th rather than the 26th, when a certified mail receipt shows correspondence was sent to Williams.

Nicole Carr called Williams about her interview. Williams stressed that she had not received a phone call from the owner and said she had not seen an e-mail informing her the check had been mailed prior to her interview with Channel 2. She pointed out the check would have been mailed outside the 3-5 business day window promised in an earlier e-mail.

“When we did the story yesterday (Thursday) I hadn’t received any phone call from the owner and just like you just informed me just now? Her (the owner’s) name is Kelli you’re saying?”

“Yes,” Carr replied.

“I didn’t even know what her name was,” Williams said. “I just knew I was talking to someone in management.”

While a Channel 2 reporter reached out to management Thursday afternoon and was told they’d have a response to the story, Ferrell said she did not know the story was airing that evening. She was dealing with a family emergency and had planned to share her side of the story Friday.

Ferrell said she was shocked to hear about Williams’ interview Friday morning.

“It just puts a bad rep on my name, you know what I mean? Ferrell told Carr. “I feel like -- just be truthful about what happens because I’m going to be truthful about what happens.”

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